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6 groundbreaking examples of tech innovations inspired by biomimicry

Da Vinci was definitely on to something when he observed birds and copied their forms to create his own wings for flight. Although biomimicry wasn’t ultimately successful in helping Da Vinci achieve flight, it has a solid track record for getting engineers, thinkers, and inventors to approach problems in design and technology by returning to nature and its processes. Here are six examples of how observing and imitating nature lead to designs that can improve issues in the modern world.

Wind turbines typically incorporate a pinwheel shape, but a breakthrough design from Tyer Wind has cleverly tapped into the gravity-defying hovering abilities of hummingbirds. While it may look like these feather-light birds are furiously flapping their wings in a linear fashion, they actually use a figure eight configuration. The design for this new turbine uses wings instead of traditional rotating blades to turn energy from wind into green electricity through 3-D Aouinian Kinematics.

After observing certain cacti’s ability to collect and store water particles from fog, students from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago were inspired to create Dewpoint, a design with real-world applications beyond the desert. By recreating a cactus’s prong-like spines and attaching them to a panel that can absorb, collect, and efficiently save water, the team is beginning to explore water security possibilities for a world that is increasingly facing drought, desertification, and disappearing water sources.

It’s a bird…it’s a train…it’s kind of both: a bullet train whose design was partially inspired by features of an owl and a kingfisher. Engineer, general manager of the tech development department for Japan’s bullet trains, and avid bird-watcher Eiji Nakatsu wanted to make his trains both faster and quieter. He first employed his observations about the noise-dampening feather parts of an owl to reduce the sound effects of the trains as they whizzed through neighborhoods and tunnels. Later, he observed that the streamlined shape of the kingfisher’s bill could be used in a new train design to further reduce noise (including a persistent sonic boom effect) and decrease necessary fuel amounts, all while reducing travel time.

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Slideshow

6 groundbreaking examples of tech innovations inspired by biomimicry

6 modern examples of biomimicry in technology

1 of 9

Da Vinci was definitely on to something when he observed birds and copied their forms to create his own wings for flight. Although biomimicry wasn't ultimately successful in helping Da Vinci achieve flight, it has a solid track record for getting engineers, thinkers, and inventors to approach problems in design and technology by returning to nature and its processes.

6 modern examples of biomimicry in technology

2 of 9

Here are six examples of how observing and imitating nature lead to designs that can improve issues in the modern world.

tyer wind turbine

3 of 9

1. Wind turbine with hummingbird wingsWind turbines typically incorporate a pinwheel shape, but a breakthrough design from Tyer Wind has cleverly tapped into the gravity-defying hovering abilities of hummingbirds. While it may look like these feather-light birds are furiously flapping their wings in a linear fashion, they actually use a figure eight configuration. The design for this new turbine uses wings instead of traditional rotating blades to turn energy from wind into green electricity through 3-D Aouinian Kinematics.

dewpoint

4 of 9

2. Cactus water collector
After observing certain cacti’s ability to collect and store water particles from fog, students from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago were inspired to create Dewpoint, a design with real-world applications beyond the desert. By recreating a cactus’s prong-like spines and attaching them to a panel that can absorb, collect, and efficiently save water, the team is beginning to explore water security possibilities for a world that is increasingly facing drought, desertification, and disappearing water sources.

bullet train

8 of 9

6. Avian-inspired train
It’s a bird…it’s a train…it's kind of both: a bullet train whose design was partially inspired by features of an owl and a kingfisher. Engineer, general manager of the tech development department for Japan’s bullet trains, and avid bird-watcher Eiji Nakatsu wanted to make his trains both faster and quieter. He first employed his observations about the noise-dampening feather parts of an owl to reduce the sound effects of the trains as they whizzed through neighborhoods and tunnels. Later, he observed that the streamlined shape of the kingfisher’s bill could be used in a new train design to further reduce noise (including a persistent sonic boom effect) and decrease necessary fuel amounts, all while reducing travel time.

Biomimicry

9 of 9

Da Vinci was definitely on to something when he observed birds and copied their forms to create his own wings for flight. Although biomimicry wasn't ultimately successful in helping Da Vinci achieve flight, it has a solid track record for getting engineers, thinkers, and inventors to approach problems in design and technology by returning to nature and its processes. Here are six examples of how observing and imitating nature lead to designs that can improve issues in the modern world.